While some details remain to be worked out, Energy Secretary Rick Perry has approved a five-year extension for Battelle Energy Alliance to continue as the management and operations contractor for the Idaho National Laboratory through Sept. 30, 2024.
Battelle Energy Alliance LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Battelle Memorial Institute, manages the laboratory with integrated subcontractors BWX Technologies, AECOM, and the Electric Power Research Institute.
Idaho National Laboratory Director Mark Peters announced the extension to INL employees on Dec. 8, via email. The extension depends on successful negotiation of certain terms and conditions, Peters said without discussing details.
“We at INL are very excited to continue to address the nation’s energy and security challenges,” he wrote.
Battelle’s current contract with INL is scheduled to expire on Sept. 30, 2019. The company in 2014 received an extension on the contract first awarded in 2004. A Battelle Energy Alliance spokesman, T.R. Massey, said contract negotiations with DOE are expected over several weeks.
INL is a nuclear energy lab managed by DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy. Both DOE’s Office of Environmental Management and the semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration have field offices there.
The laboratory is also the leading shipper of DOE transuranic waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
Fluor Idaho became the Idaho site’s cleanup contractor last year under a contract worth about $1.5 billion over five years. Among other responsibilities, the contract places Fluor Idaho in charge of moving transuranic waste out of Idaho.
